These guidelines serve to respond to calls for UNEP (through UNEP Governing Council resolutions 25/8 and 26/3) to support national implementation of integrated waste management and to the Rio+20 call for development of comprehensive national waste management strategies (paragraph 218 of the outcome document, "The Future We Want").

The strategy guidelines are intended to foster an overarching approach to national waste management planning. They build upon and cross-reference the many valuable materials that have previously been developed to provide technical support for management of individual waste streams or parts of the waste life-cycle, and to support planning in related fields such as chemicals management. The strategy guidelines also take account of recent policy emphases relating, for example, to "green economy" objectives, connections between waste management and climate change, and the potential for greater resource recovery from waste.